"So you remember nothing? Not even what color his hair or eyes were?"

"I don't even remember a man, Hokage-sama." Sakura repeats, for the twentieth time. All she remembers from the day is sparring with Sasuke, and the next thing she knew she was coughing up water on the riverbank with her worried looking teammate hovering over her before everything went black once again. Apparently a man appeared in a tree right next to her in the middle of the spar and then Sakura dropped into the river and surfaced briefly before passing out.

"Alright, well I want you to report to me immediately if anything comes back to you. With the exams next week, we need to know of everyone within our borders to ensure the safety of all of those attending." The Hokage finishes filling out the report he was writing as she and Sasuke were questioned. "You are dismissed to the care of your sensei. Kakashi should be waiting outside."

When her and Sasuke join their teacher on the street, yet more bad news is waiting for Sakura. Apparently, Dosu was attacked last night and his body was found this morning. "So I have to fight Shikamaru?! But I haven't been training for that!"

She groans and slouches as the mental fatigue of the day presses down on her even harder. She had such a good strategy formed for Dosu, and now it's worthless. Shikamaru is the king of strategy. For every plan she comes up with, he'll figure them all out and have a dozen potential counterplans.

"You've had a long day, Sakura. Why don't you let us walk you home and you just enjoy the rest of the day with your family. I'll meet with you tomorrow around noon and give you a few pointers on going toe to toe with a Nara over lunch." Kakashi's eyes close and the corners crinkle, indicating that he is smiling at her.

"Only if we get dumplings, and you actually pay." She concedes, deciding that giving herself the rest of the day off to process everything is probably for the best.

While something still feels off, Sakura has stopped worrying incessantly over the mysterious incident by the day of the finals. She couldn't figure out why, but for some reason she was obsessively checking her surroundings by using her chakra as a probe for others. She never found anything out of the ordinary though, and convinced herself she was just being paranoid.

It's only 7am and contestants don't have to report to the dome until 9:30, so Sakura takes her time with her morning bath and getting ready before eating the giant breakfast her mom has prepared for her. Sakura devours the food before heading to the backyard to do some light yoga to loosen up her muscles. At quarter to nine she goes up to her room to get ready for the exam and finds Ino waiting for her, a bag from Sakura's favorite kunoichi boutique on her arm. "You have to look your best for your match today, Forehead. Thousands of people will be watching. You don't want to look like a scrub with all of those eyes on you." She laughs when Sakura's face pales.

"Thanks for the pep talk." Sakura mutters, going to her vanity to brush the snarls out of her hair and wrap her hair with bandages in a low ponytail. Her thick hair always giver her a headache if it's up too high, and it's in the way when it's down so this is her only option. She thinks it looks homely, but in a fight that's not what matters.

"I'm serious, though! Sasuke-kun will be there too." Ino winks playfully. "I bet he'll be watching very intently."

Sakura rolls her eyes. "He doesn't see me that way, Pig, and I don't really see him like that anymore either. We're just teammates. Friends. In fact, he's kind of a jerk."

Ino is confused. "Wait, who are you and what have you done with Sakura? What did he do?"

"Well he-" Sakura spots the clock and quickly runs to her closet to get dressed. "I'll tell you all about being his teammate later, but I need to get ready for the exams!"

Ino rifles through the bag on Sakura's bed. "Which is why I brought this! You won't be promoted to chunin if you don't show up in style!" She waves a red kimono style tank top out in front of her. Sakura already has her chest bindings and black spandex on and emerges from her closet to look at the article. "Oh pig! You even had the Haruno crest embroidered on the back!"

Sakura quickly pulls on the shirt and Ino hands her a thick black belt with an attached weapon's pouch. Sakura puts that on as well and transfers her shuriken and kunai to the new pouch, reaching back and finding it's even easier than reaching down to her thigh. "Perfect!"

Ino accompanies Sakura to the dome and waits with her and the other contestants until one of the proctors comes for all of them to take them to their waiting room. Ino hugs Sakura right in front of Shikamaru before pulling on her eyelid and sticking out her tongue at her teammate. "Forehead is going to beat you so bad that big brain of yours will be mush."

Shikamaru is pulled out of his day dream by the challenge Ino has issued. "I won't lose to a girl." Is his reply, which spikes both girls' tempers.

"That's it! I don't care if you're my teammate! Sakura, make sure they never want to promote him to chunin!"

She can't believe it. Naruto actually defeated Neji. The Hyuga is flat on his back, unable to move. Medics have to come out with a stretcher and remove him from the battlefield so the tournament can continue. While bruised and more sluggish than usual, Naruto walks on his own toward the exit that will lead him back up to the other contestants.

"Where's Sasuke? He's up next." Shikamaru comments, ignoring the dirty look Sakura is still giving him for his earlier misogynistic comment.

"He'll be here." She mutters, although she is beginning to worry. Apparently he also picked up Kakashi-sensei's tardiness in the last month as well.

Naruto is already with the other contestants again by the time the announcement is made. "We are postponing the match between Uchiha Sasuke and Gaara of the Sand until after the next matchup of Haruno Sakura and Nara Shikamaru."

The boos are so loud Sakura swears she can feel the stadium shake with the soundwaves. She is about to turn and head down the stairs to the entrance to the battlefield when a strong smack to her back sends her over the railing of the balcony. She manages to channel chakra to her palms in time to grab the wall and hold herself in place, but Shikamaru plummets past her, as his reflexes are not fast enough to catch himself. Sakura laughs as Naruto and the Nara heir argue loudly while she calmly makes her way to the ground. Naruto doesn't know it, but he just inadvertently helped her towards a promotion. Not only did he give her the opportunity to demonstrate her reflexes, but also her proficiency with wall walking and concentrating chakra to different parts of her body with ease.

When Genma officially starts the match, the two opponents do not react immediately. Instead they are staring one another down, planning their moves and counterattacks, Shikamaru admittedly thinking much further ahead than even the highly intelligent Sakura is capable of. Both take notice of the giant hole Naruto created, Shikamaru storing it away as a potential way to sneak attack Sakura, and Sakura remembering to avoid its vicinity so that Shikamaru cannot catch her by surprise. They analyse each other as well, Shikamaru evaluating the costs and benefits of Sakura's fighting stance and what they indicate about her past month of training, and Sakura being annoyed by the fact that Shikamaru is slouching with his hands in his pockets. After nearly a full two minutes of just standing there, the crowd is loudly booing again. This seems to snap Shikamaru out of his strategizing and he looks to the sky as if he is watching the clouds.

Sakura is angered by his cockiness and decides to attack first, throwing a barrage of shuriken, which forces him to pay attention to her. He jumps to his left and rolls before running for the cover of the lone tree on the opposite side of the arena. Sakura is about to give chase when she is struck by the idea to take advantage of his turned back to create a few clones so she can surround and confuse him. She also uses a minor genjutsu so that each of the clones will appear to have a shadow so that he won't be able to so easily figure out which is the real Sakura. She has the advantage of him being unaware of her new repertoire of jutsu, although it is rather limited. The only genjutsus she knows are landscape based, and there are no rivers to trick him into walking into like there was with Sasuke.

Moments before Sakura catches up to Shikamaru, the cloud that had been drifting lazily across the sun passes and she belatedly realizes this means Shikamaru will be able to utilize his shadow techniques. It's a cloudy forecast today, which explains why Shikamaru was watching the sky earlier. He was estimating how long he had to wait until he could use his clan jutsu. Sakura decides using a solid bit of her chakra to create enough clones to distract Shikamaru is worth it so she can use body flicker to get as far away as possible. A second later she is on almost the opposite side of the arena, her back to the wall of it. Her shadow is hidden within the wall's, so she is safe as long as she can stay within two yards of the wall… great. Shikamaru has dispelled all of her clones already and is making his way to her from across the arena. Sakura's eyes flicker to the sky looking for the next cloud that will cross the path of the sun. She approximates that it will take about five minutes, so she braces herself for a lot of dodging and careful foot placement.

She reaches the two minute mark before one of Shikamaru's shuriken imbeds itself in her bicep. Biting her lip to keep from screaming, Sakura wrenches it out and throws it back before running up the shadow covered wall. With her hands hidden in front of her body, she quickly weaves the hand signs for a landscape genjutsu while also mixing in a few so that it will target Shikamaru in particular. She doesn't have the kind of control or practice it would take to ensnare the whole crowd, so she'll have to hope she can at least trick the Nara. She imagines the cloud moved back to where it was thirty seconds ago before weaving a few more hand signals so that it will look like she was just taking her time creating a few clones. Shikamaru instantly dispels those too, and it's all Sakura can do to make it to the five minute mark. A shadow from the cloud falls over the entire arena, and Sakura looks down and is pleased to see Shikamaru isn't retreating and is still trying to lure her into the area that he perceives as still being exposed to sunlight. He has fallen for her illusion.

Sakura weaves another genjutsu, which is really just an alteration to the one she has already cast to make sure he will see a shadow when she lands. She launches off of the wall when he releases another volley and lands where the edge of the shadow of the wall used to be. Shikamaru is on her in an instant, weaving the handsigns for his shadow possession jutsu. There is still thirteen seconds of sunlight in his genjutsu skewed perception, so his shock is very evident when his shadow does not extend to intertwine with her own. Sakura takes his bewilderment as a chance to use her body flicker technique to get in close. She doesn't try to aim, instead plowing into him and landing on top of him, quickly pulling a kunai from her back pouch and pressing it to his throat.

"Look who was just beat by a girl."